Nexus - 1901 - New Times Magazine-pages

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INFLUENZA AND THE TUBERCULOSIS CONNECTION INFLUENZA AND THE CONNECTION TUBERCULOSIS If the microbe that causes influenza is actually a form of cell-wall-deficient mycobacterium, such as the one responsible for tuberculosis, we could end up with no defences against another Great Pandemic. Part 2 of 2 s the greatest influenza pandemic of all time continued to rage, other doctors were speaking out. In 1920, with the killing fields o 1918-19 laid out before him, British physician Marcus Paterson took yet another jab at the "flu" epidemic.* He wrote: "During the time was Resident Medical Officer at Brompton, it was usual to classify a rise ol emperature in an ordinary case of ‘chronic’ pulmonary tuberculosis as influenza, even when there was no epidemic." As for the well-known sick feeling (malaise) and preliminary symptoms of reactivated tuberculosis, Paterson asked: "Are these symptoms any differen rom those of the ordinary onset of influenza? They are not, simply because hey denote not a particular disease, but a toxaemia due to bacterial action." Paterson's reference to the confusion of sorting out influenza from TB was pointed: "Surely there is no more emphatic testimony to the clinica difficulties of a differentiation between the two diseases when one group o clinicians describes a rise of temperature in a proven case of tuberculosis to be influenza, and another section terms an arrested case of tuberculosis with pyrexia [fever] an active case of tuberculosis." Writing in 1920, after the greatest pound-for-pound health catastrophe ever, Paterson said what every physician still learns as a resident: "Before the war, it was usual to classify a sudden onset of acute symptoms as influenza, and it is very easy to appreciate the reason. When a person is taken ill, the patient's friends demand to know at once what is the ailment: hence it must be given a name, and ‘influenza’ is a good enough term for the moment." What Paterson left out, as a given, was the hysteria in the family and immediate community that would intrude were the diagnosis of tuberculosis rendered. Instead, he stated that he knew of no physician who could differentiate clinically between tuberculosis and influenza. He said that he “shudders to think" of the number of times that "tubercle bacillus have been classified as influenza without further investigation". To Paterson, this represented countless opportunities to cure the real cause, masked under the designation "influenza". His conclusion: "There is no research required here. t is a known fact that what is at present called influenza is often tuberculosis. But the knowledge is not practically applied. It is information of inappreciable value lying idle. It is no new discovery, or its import would ring hroughout the world.” In fact, for Paterson, much like it was for von Unruh, "influenza" was simply the first indication of tuberculosis. Many years later, well after influenza was proclaimed "a virus", influential ohns Hopkins head of pathology Arnold Rich summed things up best:” "In relation to the question of the effect of influenza upon tuberculosis, it should be pointed out that in many cases in which pulmonary tuberculosis has been hought to have followed an attack of influenza, it is altogether probable that he supposed attack of influenza was, in reality, a manifestation of an existing uberculous infection; for tuberculoprotein, whether absorbed from a If the microbe that causes influenza is actually a form of cell-wall-deficient mycobacterium, such as the one responsible for tuberculosis, we could end up with no defences against another Great Pandemic. by Lawrence Broxmeyer, MD © 2011 The NY Institute of Medical Research, New York, USA Email: nyinstituteofmedicalresearch@yahoo.com http://drbroxmeyer.netfirms.com The NY Institute of Medical Research, New York, USA NEXUS ¢ 53 DECEMBER 2011 - JANUARY 2012 www.nexusmagazine.com